Wednesday, June 28, 2006

Sock it to me

Monday night I kept staring at the sock, and kept staring at the sock. "This is too long" I said, "I know I'm going to have to rip it back so I'll just do it now." Ripped it back to the diamonds and ripped out 2 repeats of diamonds and re-did the heel.

Now it looks too short.

Re-rip, add a diamond repeat back in and then re-knit the heel, twice (tried something funky and didn't like it). So now the sock looks the right length, the heel looks right, I have re-knit the "Allah" band at the ankle and have started the chevrons. I will be very annoyed if I removed a diamond repeat for nothing.... but it is not the end of the world.

I get to try it on the foot of the wearer in a week.

Tonight I am working on some funky dance wear for WW. I picked up some beautiful silk from SR for a choli top and I'm going to dig through my fabric horde to see if I can find some fabric for another top, and possibly a skirt. The trip to JoAnne's last night yielded some bright orange cotton for some pants and a lovely linen'oid fabric for a abba or caftan. I found some purple that would work well with the fabric from Thailand that I got from Kate, but the store was closing in 5 minutes and I decided to go back when I have more time. I think I will go back on Thursday after I give my fabric bins a good once over and see what else I need to buy.

Friday, June 23, 2006

Big feet

The Egyptian socks that are currently on the needles need to fit a size 11 1/2 foot. Oy. And they are going to be knee length and the measurment from his ankle to his knee is 16", and he is 16" around at the calf.


I'm pretty pleased with how fast it is going so far, but I'm not going to feel comfortable until I can find a size 11 1/2 foot to try it on and check the fit. It's a bit long on T's 10's so I think it will be ok.

Turned the heel last night, knit another "Allah" band and started the chevrons.

To clear up, the reason I am putting the word Allah in quotes is that historically those who have published information on the pattern have decided that the letters in the band depict the name of God, Allah. However other historians have decided that the pattern is undecipherable and may not represent God. One main theory behind that is the fact that the lowest band circles the bottom of the foot near the toe, making the wearer effectively step on the name of God, which is not cool in the Muslim world.


I agree with the argument so until I hear otherwise I will refer to that portion of the pattern as it has been traditionally known, but with the caveat of "".

I really love working with this yarn, even though I need to keep tweaking the gauge. No, I did not knit a swatch, I'm bad that way. The first pair I knit was out of a wool/ silk blend (whose name escapes me). It was a bit nubly and a higher weight than what I am using now. It knit a perfect replica of the original and it managed to fit my friend's feet. This one will have the same pattern, but more repeats. Finer yarn + bigger feet. Oh well. I'm still loving it.

I tried out a different heel, not quite like the original but I like it better than the solid I did initially.

I'd like to know how the original heel is done and no the pattern in the Folk Socks does not make the correct heel either. Maybe I should pick up this book: Ethnic Socks and Stockings. I have other friends who could use cool socks.

I really need to put the sock down for a bit. It will be frustrating to have to rip a lot out if it ends up being too big....

Wednesday, June 21, 2006

Yeti's

There is a new fighting team in Nordskogen: The Yetis. For many it was their first big war, and they did marvelously well!

This was their first day of fighting at the war and they got tons of compliments, even from a couple of kings. I think they had fun, as did the veterans.

Tuesday, June 20, 2006

The Lilies Post

Last week was Lilies 20 and I spent June 9th to the 17th sleeping in my canvas pavilion out near Smithville Lake at the Kelsey Short Youth camp for the 7th year in a row. I love Lilies. It's my chance to relax, eat good food, spend time with great friends, laugh until I'm sick and generally re-charge for the year.



Finally a nice picture of my spoked oval all painted. For those who don't know latin it reads "Get off my lawn". It did great in all the wind towards the end of the week, and what I understood was a pretty nasty storm that blew in around 3 am Saturday (I was still out drinking). I beefed up all the wood by 50% from last year and was not so concerned when the breeze picked up on Thursday and Friday.






This Lilies was a bit on the odd side. Our camp was really big so it was hard to find the cohesion and unity that we usually have. Lessons learned: the common tent has to be in direct line of the kitchen tent and the fire pit.




This year we had a bunch of new people, including my apprentice and her husband, who was one heck of a fast learner on the archery field.




This is Liz and Anne (the archery Goddess), hanging out and keeping cool in the shade of the common tent.




The final resting place of the common tent came from the great dumpster cous of 2006. When we arrived on site on Friday and went to our intended camp site we discovered that the "brilliant" staff had deposited a GIGANTIC dumpster in what normally is a very attractive camping area. Much cursing later, we decided to make the best of it and simply set up camp. We did not realize that we would be visited at 7 am each day by Larry the Cable Guy and/ Boomhower opening up the back end of said dumpster and throwing mountains of garbage that crashed within. The final straw was Wednesday morning when they used chain saws to cut down some dead branches to allow a catapiller into the back of our camp so it could compress said garbage, which was starting to smell at this time. That morning many of us were taking shelter from the sun in the common tent and wondering outloud who we had pissed off that we were beset with such a inconvienence. Suddenly there was the sound of a large engine and coming towards our camp was a semi pulling a large flat bed who scooped up the dumpster and took it away. In amazement and delight we watched it drive off. "It's gone!" we said, "but it might come back". Hmmmm..... Well if it does come back it can't really put it back in the same place if there is something already there....like a tent. Quick! Move the common space! And we did, in 30 minutes we had it down and up on the other end of the camp, completely blocking access to where the dumpster had previously been. We were sitting around congratulating ourselves and enjoying some well earned drinks when there was the now familiar sound of semi coming down the road..... The driver was quite befuddled, to say the least as he emerged from the cab wondering if he was in the right spot. I kindly directed him to the end of the road where the dumpster had been placed last year and after confirming it with a supervisor he was off and we waved goodbye.

The following evening (Thursday) was tequilla night. Oof. let's just say that once I expelled the tequilla that i had consumed it was a lovely night, but I was stumbling for several hours afterwards. Fortunately I did not have a hangover in the morning. Images before the party: LOTS of tequilla (there will be pictures of the shrine that we assembled shortly)




Images during the party




I decided to spare everyone and not include the "after the party" shots, which were pretty grim in many ways.

General photos of the camp.




General photos of my campmates.







This is my friend Eleanor, who is also my instructor in period Persian dance.


Yeah, I hate her too. Good thing she is such an awesome person! She was very sweet in saying that I could pull off that look....yeah...right.... LOL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
She's standing with Rich/Madawg who will the recipiant of the second pair of Egyptian socks. He kept me safe while I walked off my tequilla and was an amiable chaperone at the Three River's party.

Ok, so we drink a LOT at this thing....

Lilies is come and gone and now we start working on all the things for WW and all the plans for making next year even better. We did pretty good on the the tentage, nearly 75% canvas, Wa Hoo!

Here is a shot of the gang before we hit the road on the 6 hour drive home. Can you tell that we have been in the sun all week?


One thing to remember about Northshield: we are a fun bunch, we will fill your glass with homebrew and if you come to our camp you can wrestle a small black man.


Even if you are the King of Calontir.
Good times.

Where was I? Oh, right, Knitting!

So I actually have been knitting recently, although you wouldn't know it for all the posts on camping (I'll be making another one after this, but first things first).

Started a pair of socks last week at Lilies, one pair knitted in Fortissima Sock Yarn #9094 Finished them when I got back on Sunday. I have enough left over for 1 if not 2 pairs of baby socks. Cute!

I finished the body for the baby cardigan that I am knitting for one of my expecting friends. I decided to leave it at home since I didn't want to mess with charts and graphs in the campsite and settled for a simple stockinette in the round. The sweater is knit in Dale of Norway Baby Ull in Deep Blue. It will have white snowflake accents when done. The sweater is from the Soft Treasures for Little Ones Collection.

Currently I am distracted from the baby items by making another pair of Medieval Egyptian socks for a friend of mine. It's been a while since I started toe up and that was bit frustrating, but I eventially got it after some mild cursing. I started them last night and I'm up to the first "Allah" band. I think I need to knit a bit further before I decide if the size is right. I'm hovering somewhere in the middle right now. I wanted to make the socks out of cotton but could not find a cotton sock yarn that I liked. I settled on Fortissima Socka in a deep blue and white. It's a Wool/ Poly blend but it is the perfect weight and I think they will turn out great! I hope to have one mostly underway so I can try it on the foot of the receiver when I see him in July. I'd like to get them done in time for him to wear them at Pennsic, but we will see.